USyd starts semester with network outage

update The University of Sydney (USyd) has experienced a network outage that affected its phones, data and Wi-Fi networks on the first day of the second semester of 2012.

Students and staff have been unable to access their university email accounts and other USyd websites.

The fault was caused by a hardware failure that began at 2pm yesterday, with services being progressively restored between 7pm and 10pm. The hardware in question has since been removed, though the university did not specify what it was.

"As is normal in these situations, the university will review the incident to ensure we understand the underlying cause," a USyd spokesperson told ZDNet in a statement.

According to USyd, the outage did not cause major disruption to classes, and did not affect all areas of the university.

USyd was unable to specify how many staff and students were affected by the incident.

Updated at 12.27pm Tuesday 31 July 2012: added further details on the outage and comment from USyd.